DD2 and her boyfriend were out in his car the other day when one of the tyres went flat; they weren't actually on a motorway but on a dual carriageway leading to a motorway, which doesn't have a proper hard shoulder.
He would have been able to change it himself normally, but with the car being stuck in the inside lane he was going to ring his breakdown service, but before he got the chance a police car appeared and stopped behind them; the chap said they would have to be recovered by the official recovery service because they were causing an obstruction or in a dangerous place or something (DD2 said it was very scary with some traffic roaring right up to them and only going round at the last second).
The police car did stay with them until the recovery vehicle arrived - proper big one that winched the car up on top - but then they found out they would have to pay £105 for the privilege; the boyfriend's breakdown service would have done it for nothing. And the invoice said "collected on behalf of the Police Authority".
So is this another sneaky way of raising revenue, like speeding tickets? We think having the police car stopped behind them and sheilding them from traffic made it worth the fee (although they may not have had to wait so long for their own breakdown vehicle) but they were certainly stunned by the amount.